Releases

• Added: convenience tool for adding influences to existing skin cluster. Select influences, target mesh and select “Tools | Add Influence”;
• Fixed: weights will now display properly when viewport option “use default material” is turned on;
• Added: (v1 feature) Limit max influences per vertex before writing to skin cluster;
• Added: (v1 feature) Prune small weights before writing to skin cluster.

• Added: copy/paste vertex weights between different selections (tab “tools” - “copy component weights/paste average component weights”);
• Added: tool “fill transparency” - for all empty vertices in a layer, assign weights from closest non-empty vertex;
• Added: “duplicate layer” operation;
• Added: “Merge layers” operation: combine selected layers into one.

• Fixed: linux: crashing on startup

• Added: influences mapping in mirror screen will now allow matching joints by DG connections; if symmetrical joints are linked between themselves with message connections, ngSkinTools will be able to leverage that information when mirroring weights;
• Added: symmetry mesh: an option to provide an alternative mesh for calculating vertex mapping for mirroring;
• Fixed: deleting visibility node can crash maya sometimes, e.g. switching to component mode (F8) while paint tool is active

• Added: “use all joints” option for “weights from closest joint” tool; few internal optimizations to speedup operation;
• Added: “weights from closest joint” option: “create new layer”
• Fixed: “weights from closest joint”: tool is only using joints as spots, but not as segments;
• Fixed: after “weights from closest joint” operation influences list is not refreshed;
• Fixed: “weights from closest joint”: “assign” button sometimes disabled;

• Fixed: “resume in workspace” error while opening UI. Please note that Maya might have persisted your current workspace in buggy state; if you still get errors, try resetting workspace in “windows | workspaces | reset … to defaults”.

• Added: skin data will be compressed for ngSkinTools data nodes, which should substantially reduce file size for scenes with lots of skinning layers;
• Added: paint mode intensity sliders are now exponential: “smooth”, “add” and “sharpen” sliders will now be more precise for lower values, and “scale” mode will allow for more precision when setting high values.

• Added: new “Set Weights” tab contains tools to apply weights to vertex/edge/polygon selection instead of painting.
• Added: new option for smooth tool - “only adjust existing vertex influences”; when this is turned on, smooth tool will prevent influences weights spreading across the surface
• Fixed: layer mirror effects correctly saved/loaded in files;
• Fixed: mask mirror effect was not correctly used by layer blending engine

• Fixed: minor bug in 2.0.12 blocks UI from opening;

• Fixed: occasional crashes when using mirror effect on layers;
• Additional stability fixes.

• Added: option to view used influences in influences list;
• Added: hide “DQ weights” channel in influences list if skin cluster skinning method is not set to “Weight Blended”;

• Fixed: broken linux builds

• Added: pressing “f” while painting focuses viewport camera to current paint target; for joints and other influences, current joint pivot is used as camera interest point; when current paint target is a mask, viewport centers around painted values;
• Fixed: influence mapping UI error if some influences are not joints;

• Fixed: undo paint crashing Maya;
• Fixed: incorrect brush behavior with multiple viewports open;
• Fixed: incorrect mesh display / VP2 transparency setting sensitive;
• Fixed: clearing selection while painting does not update display of current mesh;

• Fixed: joint sampling on screen now displays joint positions correctly after moving them while painting.

• Added: support for non-transform skinCluster influences, e.g. matrix nodes. Due to Maya bug, ngSkinTools will use slower API to update weights in skinCluster to avoid Maya crashes, if such influences are detected.

• Added: unify weights tool: for vertex selection, calculate average weights and assign for each vertex.
• Added: highlight current joint while painting.
• Fixed: ngSkinToolsUI close/open results in broken UI state

• Fix: user hotkeys are switched to ngSkinTools2 permanently

• Fixed/updated brush invert behavior. Holding CTRL is switches quickly how brush works:
  • Replace brush intensity switches to giving quick access to “replace with zero” brush;
  • “Smooth” mode switches to “Sharpen” and vice versa;
  • “Add” mode switches to “Scale” and vice versa;
• Added joint selection on screen by joint position. Hit “S” and then drag mouse around: if you’re near a joint, it will take priority over sampling a current joint from a mesh.

• macOS builds;
• Added: optionally hide unselected vertices (“Paint/Display settings/Hide unselected vertices”);
• Added: converting layers ngSkinTools v1 to v2. This should help make an easier transition for V1 users. The conversion is a one-way action, so make sure you have a copy of your scene if you intent to continue your work in V1;
• Added: “transfer layers” action, for copying layers between meshes;
• Fixed: “create new layer” is few times faster now, but this will only be noticeable on high density meshes;
• Fixed: Maya crashes if started in batch mode while ngSkinTools is installed (fix backported from V1);
• Fixed: selecting current influence on screen does not correctly update “selected influences” in UI.

Bug fixes:

• Fixed: when paint is started in “isolate selected” mode, paint surface is not shown;
• Fixed: paint tab / display settings: display values not consistent with viewport between closing/opening viewport;
• Fixed: after toggling to original mesh, animation is not updating for that mesh while paint tool is active;
• Fixed: painting appears to be stuck if painting with 1.0 brush over 1.0 painted area - only brushes that update weights refresh brush cursor.

Not fixed:

• Stylus pressure handling is not working properly: probably a Maya 2020 bug; filed a bug to Autodesk to investigate;

Minor life quality improvements:

• Paint tab, “Show original mesh” button will appear to be pressed down when original mesh is visible;

• Fixed: hard crash if mesh is deleted during paint operation (del or ctl+x)
• Fixed: select current joint on screen: incorrect joint location drawn when joints are moved
• Fixed: some links in Help menu do not point to correct location
• Added “Help | Check for Updates”, so you can be notified when update is available;

First public release of v2. See v2 launch status for more details.